


Hoping For The Right Words

by cantthinkofausername_B_Pike



Series: Carry On Countdown 2017 [10]
Category: Carry On - Rainbow Rowell
Genre: Carry On Countdown, First Kiss, M/M, Songfic, ive never written songfic before
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-04
Updated: 2017-12-04
Packaged: 2019-02-10 16:38:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,277
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12915909
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cantthinkofausername_B_Pike/pseuds/cantthinkofausername_B_Pike
Summary: Two short vignettes: Pining!Baz and the actual Snowbaz getting together.Title and lyrics from Black Butterflies and Deja Vu by The Maine





	Hoping For The Right Words

**Author's Note:**

> All righty if you guys haven't heard the song this is based on, it's not _necessary_ but it's a good idea. Go check it out.

BAZ

I open my eyes, and for a second I can’t quite figure out why the room is so dark. Then it hits me – somehow, I’ve woken up _early_. It’s horrifying. I roll over and burrow under my mountain of blankets. (Snow has the window open even though it’s the _middle of bloody November_ and it’s _absolutely freezing_ outside. I’m too cold to get up and close it.)

For a second, I think I could fall back asleep. The moment doesn’t last long though. I don’t know what I was dreaming about, but it left me with no chance of going back to sleep. It’s like when you dream about ants or a snake, and then you don’t want to put your feet under the covers again.

I turn on my side, so I’m facing Simon. If I’m going to be up, I might as well take advantage of the opportunity. Snow is usually up long before I am. Long before any normal person should think of waking, really, but since when has Simon Snow fallen into any category of “normal person.”

Right now, he’s sprawled out on his bed with his face smashed into the pillow in such a way that I wonder how he is still capable of breathing. The moonlight streaks his bronze curls with silver. Somehow, all of his blankets have fallen off the bed, but he isn’t cold. I can’t keep my eyes away from the bare skin of his back and the constellation of moles there. I want to kiss each one, to chart his body with my mouth.

He rolls over, revealing the smooth planes of his chest, and my breath catches in my throat. I can see his face now, mouth hanging open (mouth breather) and eyes twitching under closed lids. He’s beautiful. He’s always stunning, but now he’s so peaceful that I’m not sure he’s real, because things this perfect don’t exist. 

At some point in the last couple of years, watching Snow sleep became my life’s consolation prize. I will never be with him; the Chosen One needs someone golden. I’m doomed to be the villain of the story. But at night, I can pretend. Pretend that I’m allowed to feel this way about him, that he wants me too. 

I’m not sure how long I’ve been staring. It feels like forever and no time at all. The black of the room has faded into a predawn gray when Simon Snow opens his eyes. At first, the change doesn’t register. I’m still watching Simon, only now I’m drowning in his beautiful, boring blue eyes. 

“Are you watching me sleep, Baz?” Simon asks, still half-asleep. “I get you’re plotting and all, but really?”

I must’ve drank too much last night, because I turn bright red. Thankfully, he didn’t read the love that I’m sure was written all over my face. I want to make some sort of cutting comeback, but I can’t think. All I do is angrily roll over and put in my earbuds. I shuffle my top-secret playlist (I absolutely do not have a playlist filled with love songs titled “Simon.” Nope.) and squeeze my eyes shut, as though I can dream myself a different world.

 _What would you say if you could say Everything you needed to To the one you needed to?_

I imagine myself confessing to Simon; I’ve imagined it a thousand times. Kiss him, kill him. I can’t picture a scenario where he isn’t disgusted by me. And even if he wasn’t, where I wouldn’t bring him down. So I wait for the inevitable, where we fight and I lose, and I pass the time by falling deeper and deeper in love with him.

_You flash like a setting sun,_

_You come around, I come undone,_

_Can’t find the sound under my tongue_

_When I look at you._

 

***

 

SIMON

It’s happened one too many times. Baz has always had a tendency to stare at me, usually in hatred or deep plotting. But for the last few months, I keep catching him looking at me with a strange expression on his face, one I don’t recognize. When he notices I’ve caught him, he looks almost embarrassed. I don’t know what is going on, but I intend to find out.

I wait until Baz returns to the room after football practice. His hair is still damp from the shower in the lockers, and when did I start noticing how his shirt clings to his chest? I shake my head to snap out of it. I want to talk to Baz, not ogle him.

“Baz?”

“Mhm?” He retrieves a hairbrush from the bathroom and begins to work out the tangles.

“You, ah, you’ve been staring at me. Recently.”

He freezes, hairbrush still in his hair. “I have?”

“Yeah. Kind of a lot, actually.”

I can see Baz weigh the merits of denying his actions and decide not to. He doesn’t say anything. I don’t think he knows what to say. Baz at a loss for words is an interesting sight.

“Why?”

“I didn’t mean to.”

I wrinkle my brow in confusion. “How do you not mean to stare at me?”

“You just,” he waves a hand to indicate my general existence, “you.”

I’m not getting whatever it is that he’s trying to say, and I tell him so. Instead of replying, he digs out his phone and plugs in earbuds. After queuing up a song, he passes the phone to me. His eyes are asking me to understand, so I put in the earbuds and press play.

The song is – not what I expected. It’s a lot more mellow and indie than anything I would’ve guessed Baz listened to, and I still don’t get why this particular song was so important. Until the lyrics start.

 

_I lose my voice when I look at you_

_Can’t make a noise though I’m trying to_

_Tell you all the right words_

_Waiting on the right words._

 

I take one earbud out and press pause. I want to say something, anything. This is a confession, I realize, and I hate to make him sit in silence and wait for me to understand.

“Keep listening,” he says, so I do.

 

_Just another lovesick afternoon_

_Black butterflies and déjà vu_

_Hoping for the right words_

_Waiting for the right words._

 

“Baz, you love me?” I’m tearing up, and it’s not from this song. It’s the idea that distant, beautiful Baz could love me, a broken creature.

He smiles sadly, and I know I’m right. That’s what he was trying to tell me. That’s the expression I’d seen on his face, the one that wasn’t hatred or plotting. Love.

 

_Just yesterday north of LA_

_I couldn’t help but think of you_

 

I don’t have to keep my eyes away from him. From his cloudy eyes, blue and gray and green all at once. From the places where his wet hair has made his t-shirt transparent. I don’t try to keep the hunger off of my face. I want him to see it.

“Can I kiss you?”

He breathes a “yes,” and I lunge forward to him. When our lips meet, I rip out the one remaining earbud. I don’t want anything that isn’t Baz. I couldn’t say how long I’ve wanted this, or how long he has, but we kiss with a ferocity that’s almost like fighting. I can still hear the song in my mind, can still hear Baz’s confession.

 

_Every time I think of you_

_You crash like a rolling wave_

_You come around I lose my brain_

_Can’t find the sound under my tongue_

_When I look at you._


End file.
